UK trade: The dismal performance of British exporters continued to drag
on the economy as the UK racked up its biggest trade deficit since records
began over the three months to October.

Tax rises: More than a million people will pay a higher rate of tax by
2015 because of George Osborne’s decision to raise income tax thresholds by
less than the rate of inflation, the Institute for Fiscal Studies said. The
Government may also be forced to impose higher taxes or deeper cuts to
protected departments such as the NHS.

European Central Bank: The ECB has left the door open to further rate
cuts as it reduced its growth forecasts for the eurozone. The ECB left its
key rate unchanged at 0.75 per cent and predicted that the region’s economy
would shrink by 0.5 per cent this year.

Hector Sants: Britain’s former top financial watchdog is in talks about
taking a senior role at Barclays, raising fresh questions about the
revolving door between regulators and the big banks. Sants is understood to
be considering accepting a senior compliance and regulatory job at the bank
that he once believed was too aggressive.

US fines: HSBC and Standard Chartered are facing fines of more than
$2.4 billion from American regulators over accusations of illegality
overseas.

Swaps compensation: The Financial Services Authority has been accused
of preventing up to 10,000 businesses from accessing compensation for those
who believe they have been mis-sold “swaps”, interest rate hedging products.

Prada: Asian demand for European luxury goods helped Prada to beat
quarterly forecasts and lifted hopes for Christmas sales of its bags and
dresses. The company reported a 30 per cent rise in third-quarter profits to
€122 million.

ArcelorMittal: Lakshmi Mittal plunged the French Government into crisis
last night after appearing to back out of a deal to save a steel plant in
Lorraine. The move left President Hollande’s socialist Cabinet facing fury.

Starbucks: Kris Engskov, managing director of the coffee group’s UK
business, announced the scrapping of the controversial royalty scheme that
allowed it to sidestep corporation tax and made a commitment to pay £10
million in each of the next two years.

Kazakhmys: The Kazakhstan miner is to proceed with its second- biggest
copper project in that country, a $2 billion mine at Aktogay which is 250km
from the Chinese border. The development is partfunded by the China
Development Bank.

Premier Farnell: The electronics distributor, whose performance is
often regarded as a reflection of the global economy, saw its revenues fall
by 1.6 per cent in the quarter to end-October. This led to an 18 per cent
decline in pre-tax profits to £17.3 million.

CareTech Holdings: The provider of homes for adults with learning
difficulties said that profits before tax rose by 5 per cent to £16.7
million in the year to end-September, with no sign of a squeeze on fees.

Micro Focus International: Adjusted pre-tax profits at the business
software supplier rose by 4.4 per cent to $87.5 million in the six months to
end-October and indicated that the $130 million special dividend paid to
investors last month could be repeated over each of the next two years.

Orange Austria: EU regulators will decide on Hutchison 3G’s planned
€1.3 billion bid for France Telecom’s Orange Austria next week, the EU’s
antitrust chief said, in a sign that the deal is likely to be approved.

Virgin Rail: After failures in the franchise award scheme Virgin will
continue to run services on the West Coast Main Line for two years. The
contract was awarded to FirstGroup two months ago but then scrapped.

Npower: The electricity and gas supplier has apologised for making
nuisance calls to its customers after it was fined £60,000 by Ofcom, the
telecoms regulator. It fell foul of rules relating to so-called abandoned
calls.

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